Amit Shah to launch Kerala yatra today as BJP eyes Opposition space

New Delhi: Taking its fight against the “red terror” to the doorstep of Kerala chief minister Pinnarayi Vijiyan, with its national president launching a 15-days-long “Janraksha Yatra” from Kannur, the BJP on Monday accused the state’s ruling party CPI(M) of promoting “murder politics” and blamed it for the unabated growth of jihadi terrorism in this southern state.

Mr Shah will launch the yatra on Tuesday from Kannur and will himself participate for three days. Kannur is the home district of chief minister Pinarayi Vijiyan and had often witnessed political violence involving Sangh and the Left cadre. Even the RSS supremo Mohan Bhagwat during his “Vijaydashmi” speech had accused the Kerala government of supporting “anti-national elements and violence” which was vehemently rejected by Mr Vijiyan who said that Mr Bhagwat’s remark was nothing but the Sangh’s oft-used formula to pit people against one another. BJP state unit said Mr Shah will also walk past the home of Mr Vijayan at Pinarayi on October 5.

Kerala is on the key state, where BJP’s organisational strength remains unimpressive and the RSS headed Sangh Parivar, has been propagating the “demographic imbalance.” The BJP’s state unit had been requesting the central leadership to take up the issue of “red terror” in a big way and also how the state machinery was being “misused” against the saffron cadre. The state is also under Mr Shah’s radar for increasing the organisational and support base. Ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP is trying hard to emerge as a credible alternative in this state which has seen mostly the Left and the Congress led governments.

Though Mr Shah will launch the “padyatra” from Payannur in Kannur on Tuesday, he will first visit the Rajarajeswara temple located at Taliparamba. Several central ministers and some chief ministers of BJP ruled states will also participate in the 15 day long ‘padyatra’ and highlight the ‘red terror’ which the sangh parivar including the BJP had been accusing for the killing and attack on the saffron cadre. The BJP has only one member in the 140- member Assembly.

“The ‘M’ in CPI(M) now stands for “Maoists” and not “Marxists,” claimed Union minister Prakash Javadekar as he accused the ruling state party of using violence as a “tool to suppress the saffron party.”

Mr Javadekar said his party would use democratic means to protest the Left’s violence in the same manner Mahatama Gandhi used non-violence to oppose the British. He accused the ruling CPI(M) of “murder politics” and claimed that it had become desperate due to the saffron party’s growing popularity and had started state-sponsored violence against its workers. Mr Shah will also attend the concluding day of the yatra on October 17 and address a public meeting.  

The BJP had claimed that as many as 120 of its workers, 84 in Kannur alone, had been killed in the state since 2001 with 14 of them in the chief minister’s home town since he took the reigns last year. The CPI(M) had, in turn, accused the BJP and the RSS of resorting to violence and denied the involvement of its government and leadership in political killings.